The walk to and from school was about 2 miles. You would have thought that'd help me lose weight, but I sabotaged myself at the sweet shops en route. My waddling mass couldn't keep up with my friends in the first week or two going to school (especially up the hill in Cowes) but I eventually increased my walking speed.
My first class was 9C, with Mr Clarke. I sat with my friend James F and reunited with my primary school friends, Andrew H and Charlie C, who didn't go to ABK. I spent time with the people I knew best and I was gregarious enough to make a few new friends, but I was very self conscious, especially because of my fat. One boy, Marcus, who was way down the spectrum, terrorised me through these first years. He followed me all the way home once. That really spooked me. One day when I had been feeling unwell, Dad had written a note to Mr Reynolds excusing me from PE. Unfortunately he had typed it on our brand new Windows 95 desktop computer, and although he had signed it, Mr Reynolds said dryly, "nicely typed", to which Marcus danced around the changing room chanting "Fatty forged a note!" to everyone, and then continued this all the way up to the top field. He may have even continued this in the following days, I can't remember .
Despite the occasional run ins with Marcus, I was steady in class. I got involved in various things, such as the Newtown Science camp, organised by Dr Freytag and Mr Rana. Among our group were my crushes Christina G, and later Judith F (and later her sister Anna). I also got asked by one of the science teachers Mr Challoner if we in the astronomy club were interested in doing the astronomy GCSE! I got a C (which was the top grade for the foundation level paper).
My GCSEs were okay, it was a stressful time for all of us and we were told it would be the most stressful exams we would ever revise for. Perhaps because there was just such a broad range to revise. Mum often made sure we went though Letts revision books, it became overwhelming at times with her incessance in trying to get me to understand the next maths problem. I regarded her as being very much an expert at maths and I felt pressure to rise to her expectations. I got four A's, four B's a C, and a D. The D was for religious studies. I evidently wasn't convincing enough in my arguments. It was enough to get me into Sixth Form to do my A Levels, which was also at Cowes High except you could wear your own clothes!
When I turned 16 mum encouraged me to get a Saturday job. I had a very brief stint at the tea rooms of Osborne House, and then I got a job at Gateways just as it turned into Somerfields. I preferred stacking the shelves than working the tills, I was at too awkward an age to deal with customers! I particularly enjoyed working with my supervisor Ian, a confident middle aged man with a childish sense of humour. I was so excited to get my first payslip, it was only about a hundred pounds but I felt so rich! I also volunteered to work over Christmases and New Years, where I was offered triple pay!
I had a girl with a crush on me, Sam, who sort of went to the year 11 prom with me. She was South African, and was quite lovely. I was so flattered and excited when she asked me to dance after I tried to escape the dance floor when the slowies started, but I was too timid to do talk to her afterwards. I was terrified of girls.
Sixth Form was much more enjoyable. I was finally with a good set of friends, most of the more rough students had left, I had lost weight thanks to mum's summer boot camp and diet of leaves in 2001, and I was studying subjects I enjoyed - maths, geography, physics and english literature. Well, literature was the last on the list out of the choice of that, art or PE. It turned out to be my best subject, in which I got top marks at A Level! I'm apparently good at interpreting poems and soliloquys. Our teacher Mrs Rooke was pretty fun too, like a loving grandma who shared with us a dry but gentle sense of humour. I didn't actually manage to read many books per se, but I did listen to them on audio cassette so I could at least write about them in the exams and it paid off really well!
On Thursdays I would get the bus with my friend Laurie W into Newport, as I had an organ lesson in the afternoon. We would sometimes get KFC. A small but regular little tradition which is probably worth a mention to remember. I was getting good at the organ by this time, having done concerts every year. In 2001 myself and a girl called Jenna M represented Yamaha Music Schools southeast in a national concert at the Birmingham Symphony Hall in front of three thousand people. We played Fanfare for the Common Man (the Emerson Lake and Palmer version). I was lead trumpet. It terrifying but brilliant!
I developed another crush, this time on Bonnie, one of my friends in sixth form. She was in my geography and literature classes. It started as a slight interest, but over time I became infatuated with her. Over the course of about 18 months I may have told one or two close friends, but everyone seemed to know eventually, so to avoid the rumour doing any damage I had no option but to finally confront my fear of rejection and take her to one side and aske her, heart to heart, if we could be together. She said she couldn't and gave me a big understanding hug. I like to think I took it in my stride. I still think about it 20 years later though.
I got involved in a school musical, playing the electric piano in a jazzy production called "the Hat Stand", which is basically about a museum like mental asylum and all the hallucinations that the characters face. We rehearsed for months, as well as doing a few jazz numbers for the group itself. I was okay, but I needed a lot of direction and I couldn't improvise as well as the brass players. I felt like a bit of a fraud, but I was popular as I had just passed my driving test and I was able to drive all the girls home!
I had no idea what I wanted to do after school. Mum usually managed to find faults in my choices. I wanted for a long time to be an airline pilot, but looking back it may have been a mix of the uniform, and the excitement of going on a plane as we went so infrequently anyway. At a school run careers interview which my parents also came along to, we discussed what I might like to look into. It was decided (but half heartedly by me) that I should aim for civil engineering, as "there's a big call for civil engineers". However I was reaching my ceiling in my maths and physics abilities and surging ahead with geography, possibly because of Bonnie's influence. Or more likely because the subject was simply more varied and interesting.
For my 18th birthday mum and dad let me hold a house party at home! They even helped me get in the supplies, and they stayed over at Cowes for most of the night! I had about 30 people round, and everyone was very well behaved. We all got very drunk though. The only thing missing from the house was the tea cosy which Luke W wore home as a hat, but returned it the following week. I woke up still drunk the next day, when I had an organ concert to play in! It didn't go very well... My foot shook all the way through Hymn to the Fallen. It was only after that that the hangover struck!
I put in hours of revision for my A Levels, did the Letts workbooks, made hundreds of revision cards and got as stressed as anyone else in my year, as well as having a Saturday job. Mum took me round different universities, and they were all very nice but all very different. Not having experience of life off the Island made it difficult to judge which my favourite was. I opted for Cardiff, as it was a high ranking university and had the nicest facilities. Portsmouth was the worst, they had very few labs and the technical drawings on the wall were by students from the university of Brighton!
I got A, B, D on my A Level exams (Lit, Geography and Maths). This was just little short of my university choice of Cardiff, but I did manage to get a place at the University of Surrey through the clearing system.
I spent three weeks at Surrey University studying the foundation principles of Civil Engineering. A mix of being homesick and being out of my depth with the new maths and physics meant that I called home after three weeks in tears asking if I could come home. I had never been so ashamed of myself. I thought I had let my family and myself down. I felt I had no future.
Little did I know that at the age of 18, with supportive parents, friends, and a willingness to do well, many doors can be opened. I consider myself very lucky to have had the opportunities that followed.
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